


no killer instinct .

by daredoll



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Gen, evie meets her father, it does not .....go well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-15
Updated: 2018-03-15
Packaged: 2019-03-31 20:13:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13982499
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daredoll/pseuds/daredoll
Summary: pirates are forged in desperation, and the huntsman is no different from any other cast off man. evie finds her father in a chip shoppe; she wishes she had left him in her imagination.





	no killer instinct .

**Author's Note:**

> very, very slight reference to parental abuse but just in case !

It starts out as a secret shared. (All good friendships start the same in her novels.) It is, perhaps, a month after their adventure together. Their truce, or whatever it is, is still new, fragile, uncomfortable. They are not four friends, but four teenagers, very different teenagers, tip-toeing around each other. Evie wants to strengthen the bond, wants to make Mal like her as well as stand her. (This is not one of her novels.) So one night as they hole up in the fae’s bedroom at the discount castle, the air stale with uncertainty and silence, she pipes up.

“I think I know who my father is,” the princess offers, voice lowered conspiratorially. It catches their attention, certainly. Carlos leans in, genuine interest in brown eyes. Carlos is _always_ genuine, and she _always_ appreciates it. Jay is more sly with his attention, only leaning forward incrementally even as she can practically see his ears straining. Mal— Mal makes her almost instantly regret her words. Mal looks like the cat that ate the canary, or perhaps is just about to. There’s a diabolical spark in her eyes, and Evie is reminded that they are _not_ friends. Still, to keep silent is to admit fear, and that is not something to do around these three. “The Huntsman.”

“Really?” full lips caress the words treacherously. Maleficent’s daughter is toying with her now, examining her fingernails in faux boredom. “I dare you to find him then. We’ll want to hear all about it. ”

 

Heels click against the wooden planks of the pier, only the light leaking from Ursula’s Fish & Chip Shoppe illuminating her way. A shiver runs up her spine, knowledge that no one has her back catching her step for a moment, just like the knotty hole her stiletto catches in. A deep breath is taken as she pauses, stitches her confidence back together, frees herself. It may be dark. It may be pirate territory. But she is Princess Evaine Grimhilde, daughter of the Evil Queen, and she can handle anything they throw at her.

She struts as she passes through the saloon doors, dark eyes scanning the scene before her— from sword check to packed room and more ruffians than she’s ever seen in one place. It’s busy enough that she can nearly slip in unnoticed, but two steps into the fray and her way is blocked by the chest of a crimson-clad pirate, familiar in legacy and reputation only. From the breast pocket of her leather jacket, nimble fingers pull a white handkerchief, trimmed with more frilly lace than necessary, and wave it before sea glass eyes. _A white flag for ceasefire. Truce._

“Easy, pirate boy,” words bit by teeth as stark as her flag, bared in something half-smile and half-snarl. “I don’t want any trouble.” Honey hues spot his captain behind him. What was this, then, Uma’s guard dog? Or perhaps from the flicker of something wild in ocean eyes, **_mad dog_ ** might be more accurate.

“Haven’t you heard, princess? We don’t serve VKs,” the shorter girl states, nudging Hook out of her way and standing center stage, arms crossed confidently before her. The words are easy, but contempt is visible in the depths of her dark gaze. For a moment Evie is struck by how pretty she is, nothing like how Mal had described her except perhaps in size. She wonders if Uma has the same thought, if Mal had described her so cruelly as she’d been locked in her tower. Still, there’s no time for pondering, not with the two about to heft her from the eatery, or perhaps something worse, and before she accomplishes what she came for.

Evie reaches into another pocket, pulls out far more Isle tokens than they deserve, and with batted lashes plays every card of charm she has in her deck. “Come now, Uma. We haven’t even had a chance to catch up since my party, and you know royalty always tips well.”

Onyx eyes flit from the currency to her own mahogany hues, narrowing even as a sly smile bares white teeth. A pause, the offer pondered for half a moment before teal-tipped fingers snatch the money from her hand. Without a word the money again changes hands, the two pirates so in sync they give even Mal and Jay stiff competition. (She can’t help but wonder if the Hook boy can count as well as she’s heard he can tell time, **_as in NOT WELL AT ALL_ ** , based on the way his icy blues skim the tokens.)

“That is a nice tip,” Uma chuckles, making it clear enough that she’s not getting any clam strips in return. “What do you want, Evie? Evil knows you didn’t come for the food.”

A giggle of her own bubbles past candy-apple lips. The sea witch’s daughter is right, of course. The place reeks of fat and oil and something undeniably FISHY. “A little vulture told me the _Jolly Roger_ ’s back. That the crew’s come here to— well, do something that ends in yo ho?”

“The point, lassie,” Harry pipes in, a roll of his eyes accenting his lack of patience. So like his father, wasn’t he?

“The huntsman.” Gaze flits around the room, casual tone belying the knots in her stomach. “He’s a member of your father’s crew, isn’t he?” A look exchanged between the two pirates, Uma’s grin growing comfortably devious as Harry’s smirk grows dangerously smug.

“Aye, princess, isn’t he a bit old for a conquest?” A flirtatious wink meets the smirk. “Old enough tae be yer da, even.” It’s a tease, everything in the teen’s posture screams it, but that his joke is truth strikes her. Lips purse before she can stop them, an uneasy swallow follows, and it’s too much weakness to show in front of the two. Two sets of swashbuckling eyes widen, and where her jaw is tight, theirs drop.

“Just fucking tell me where he is,” she mutters, royal etiquette dropped in her shame. Stunned glances shared, again as in tune to one another as anything she’s ever seen, before light eyes rove the eatery and a hook is gestured to a quiet far corner.

 

Sat by himself is a large man, dark hair and an unkempt beard. He looks like any other pirate, but his clothes are not nearly as haggard, all shades of brown. She really doesn’t want to approach him. She has to.

“You’re my father.” It’s one hell of an opening statement, made as she seats herself across from the weathered man and tucks one ankle behind the other  
  
“Evaine?” He isn’t a handsome man, not really, not at all, but he had been loyal. (Her mother had repeated that quietly, stopped her own train of thought to say that he was weak.) The Isle has not been kind to him, and neither has his time among the crew of a notorious pirate ship. The Huntsman is nothing like the debonair king of a father she had imagined as a little girl. Part of her is disgusted, at least until his eyes widen. She’s startled at what she sees in them. They’re her eyes. Brown and soft. It casts her off balance, and the only way the princess can collect herself is to play cool, cruel, like her mother.

“Evie,” she corrects flippantly, tosses a navy curl behind her shoulder. He nods shallowly, swallows thickly. She can feel those same eyes as hers studying her features, cataloging every inch of her face. It doesn’t feel the same as when Mother does it, when she searches for something out of place or anything to critique. She would say his gaze is tender, if she could pretend to recognize paternal affection like this.  
  
“The queen told—” he begins, but she can tell where he’s hinting.

“Mother drank too much of Madam Mim’s bathtub wine one night. She also said too much.” The explanation is dry. It hints nothing toward the emotions the night had stirred in her. The excitement of finally knowing her true birthright. The utter devastation at discovering her humble roots.The way her mother had warned her not to become like her father. How many times she pointed out his weakness. It was the most important thing that the Evil Queen had ever told her. She pretends it wasn’t. At the shine in her father’s eyes, the princess is quick to squash it. “She doesn’t know I’m here.”

“You should listen to—” he begins again, his voice somber and touched with near reverence. It feels like a strike across her face. She can’t cut him off fast enough.

“You still love her.” It’s gutting. It’s embarrassing. _Romance didn’t matter._ Love wasn’t real. How could her own father not realize that? What kind of—— was her whole life a joke then, too? That this pathetic man could be her father? The father of a heartbreaker, a future queen, and he was too WEAK to keep his own heart intact? “She threw you out. Banished you from her sight. Left you, kept your daughter from you! Forced you to become this. A huntsman turned two-bit pirate! And you LOVE HER ?”

Her voice raises with each assertion, each assumption, cheeks coloring red in her ill-aimed anger. By the last two words she’s no longer sitting, has her hands planted on the table as she admonishes him. _He—_

He takes it. His mouth presses into a thin line, brow furrowing and far too many wrinkles growing upon it. He looks old and tired and maybe even hurt. If she had said anything similar to her mother, the Evil Queen would have struck her, left a welt of a handprint on her cheek with the force of her slap. The huntsman only looks at her, gaze still soft and searching, as if memorizing her. _She—_

“You’re so weak.” When, exactly, had the Chip Shoppe grown so quiet? That even her quiet cruelty nearly echoes in the packed room as well as her own head. Her hands are trembling now, teeth catch at her lower lip, something close to tears sparks at her eyes. All she can do is disguise it as rage. Why does he take it? Why does he still look at her as if she set the stars in the sky? “You’re disgusting. _You disgust me_.”

Curls flipped over her shoulder, Evie glares at him a moment longer before turning and fleeing, walking as fast as she can, shoving her way through the crowd, catching elbows and snagging her hair in haste. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is that she get out of this wretched chip shoppe! Five steps to the door. Three steps. One. The night air doesn’t help her breathe any easier. Why doesn’t it help? Why doesn’t she feel better?

 

There’s a rough hand on her shoulder, from the strangled call of ‘Harry’ she’d heard a moment earlier she has just the idea of who it belongs to. The grip jerks her back, has her spinning on high heels round to face tousled hair and even wilder eyes. It’s good that he looks angry, but still not enough. She wants to cry and scream and break something (another of her mother’s mirror’s perhaps? Anything that reminds her whose eyes are staring back at her.), but instead she forces the rampant emotions into ire. (It doesn’t feel as good as crying. Damn him.)

“Get your filthy, common hand off me,” she spits, shoving away his grip as if it were something rotten.

“No one talks tae one of my da’s crew like that,” he replies heatedly, stepping too close into her space. She’s seen Hook in action before, of course. If there was anyone who matched her methods, perhaps even outdid her, it was the pirate. Playing dangerous flirt was an art, mixing intrigue and charm and bloodlust in one look was his specialty, always leaving you wondering if he was going to kiss you or hook you. Hers was more manipulative, always leaving you wanting more, wanting a taste, making you willing to do anything for her. There’s nothing romantic between them now though. No innuendo. No charm. They’re both just pissed. _What an interesting turn of events._

“The day I answer to a dirty pirate like you is the same they bury me in the ground. Back. Off.” Each word bitten out, angry, as she moves to turn and walk away, nose in the air. Again she’s halted, his grip tighter this time, and she can suddenly understand why some on this island enjoyed violence so much. Before he can haul her back to face him, she’s whipping around. Movements hidden behind a flurry of navy tresses, manicured fingers settle on the switchblade hidden and nestled in the hair at the nape of her neck, and in one fluid movement the blade is triggered and held at his neck.

“Fucking try it.” Threats aren’t often past ruby lips, especially this close. She prefers goading and trash talking from afar, hurtling stinging insults like her mother’s poisons, left to haunt their targets deepest insecurities. This is new, and her chest is rising and falling with the adrenaline, and something sick inside her is just begging him to do exactly that. Instead a dark chuckle passes his lips, unnaturally light eyes never once straying to the knife, simply holding her gaze. Where she can feel her heart practically pounding out of her chest he is calm, collected, almost seeming to enjoy this.

“N’aw princess,” he teases, manic glint in his eyes just begging to be knocked out. Evie, for once, can completely comprehend why Jay hates him so much. “Ye sure ye want tae challenge me? Did Jay even teach ye how tae use that blade?” Out of the corner of her eye she spots the glint of metal as he raises his hook ever so slowly, and maybe she is outmatched. Maybe this was a poor decision? Maybe she wouldn’t mind getting hurt if it meant a distraction from the night’s events.

“You think the rest of the core’s going to care that I drew first?” Frown deepens (LINES ! FROWNS ONLY LEAD TO WRINKLES.) as she presses the blade into his skin, still not enough to draw blood but enough to threaten. He giggles again, the sound intensely eerie in the night air.

“Drew what? That pretty little blade? Or blood, hmm?” He’s fucking— he’s goading her into it. She should. She won’t. She could. His gaze, nearly as reflective as her castle’s many shattered looking glasses, holds her dark one, just daring her. Neither flinches, neither moves, that same cocky smirk set on his sharp features. She’s a VK! What was a little blood on her hands? (and it would only be a little blood. Just enough to show him she wasn’t to be trifled with. That she belonged in the core.)

**_She can’t._ **

Nimble fingers retract the blade, slip it into her waist. Regret plays across her features, guilt coloring the set of her lips more so than even her lipstick. Her free hand shoves against his chest, doing little in her attempt to push him away before in a whirl of her skirts she’s making her last attempt to slip away.

 

“Ye really are his daughter.” His voice carries behind her, this time doing more to stop her in her tracks than his grip did. “ _No killer instinct._ ” Azure crown tilts, turns ever so slightly back to him, royal mouth fumbling for something scathing to retort, but for once even she is at a loss for words.

“Not always a bad thing. He’s—— ye should give ‘im a chance.”

**Author's Note:**

> really kenn? another wip ?? yeah, i know. i suck. but this would not leave my head ?? there's more to come on harry & the huntsman ( either in the next chapter or a separate one shot but ! catch hook being a shitty dad and the hunstman being too weak to be cruel to a lost little pirate ! ) there's EVEN MORE to come with evie coming to terms with her father and ?? it's gonna be cute ok.


End file.
